LAUSANNE, Switzerland — The doctor who ran a massive doping program to use steroids on East German swimmers in the 1970s and ’80s had his award from the sport’s world governing body annulled on Tuesday.
Lothar Kipke admitted in a Berlin court in 2000 that he helped design and run a doping system that helped the communist state win dozens of Olympic medals.
Kipke was convicted 21 years ago on 58 counts of causing bodily harm and was given a 15-month suspended jail sentence. Swimmers alleged the doping they were subjected to cause birth defects in their children.
World swim body FINA said its ruling committee voted Tuesday to remove Kipke from its honors list. The award was given in the 1980s for being a member of its medical commission.
The decision followed “extensive consultation with the swimming community,” FINA said, since the election in June of its president Husain al-Musallam.
“There is no place for doping in aquatics and certainly no place for individuals who have been found guilty of causing great damage to our sport, and cheating clean athletes of a fair chance,” al-Musallam said in a FINA statement.
“For a doctor to harm athletes in the search for medals is unacceptable and I am proud that FINA has decided to send a clear message,” the Kuwaiti official said.
The decision follows a long-running campaign by veteran aquatics journalist Craig Lord to pressure FINA to recognize Kipke’s misconduct.
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